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Billionaire David Koch, who along with his brother Charles has built a formidable political network, speaks in 2013 in Orlando, Fla. at an event sponsored by Americans for Prosperity.
(AP Photo/Phelan M. Ebenhack, File)

The Koch brothers' political network – demonized by Democrats and praised by Republicans as one of the most powerful conservative forces in American politics – will make its debut in Oregon politics next week.

The Koch-connected Freedom Partners on Wednesday is set to begin an estimated $3.6 million television advertising campaign in Oregon aimed at unseating Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley and electing Republican challenger Monica Wehby.

For Wehby, who has lagged in polls and in fundraising behind Merkley, the jolt of outside spending could transform the race and perhaps attract other deep-pocketed donors. Merkley, meanwhile, can no longer count on having a financial advantage and will have to hope that the Freedom Partners campaign doesn't erode his standing with Oregon voters.

The advertising campaign marks the entry into Oregon politics this year of "dark money" --political cash that comes from undisclosed donors. While billionaire industrialists Charles and David Koch have become well-known public figures, it's unclear how much they've personally spent on politics, and their network of other wealthy donors is largely unknown.

"We will be knee deep in the 2016 elections before we know much about what Freedom Partners are doing right now," said Robert Maguire, an investigator for the Center for Responsive Politics, a non-partisan campaign finance watchdog group. "They can spend massive amounts of money without revealing their donors."

In conjunction with The Washington Post, Maguire found that the Koch network raised at least $407 million in the 2012 elections – much of which remained hidden at the time. The spending comes amid a flood of big-donor political money flowing as the result of court decisions, most notably the U.S. Supreme Court's Citizens United, that is transforming election campaigns.

"We're basically getting close to almost an unregulated system," said Ken Mayer, a political scientist at the University of Wisconsin who is an expert on campaign finance.

Overall, Freedom Partners Chamber of Commerce, Inc. – the full name of the group that bought advertising in Oregon – reported spending $238 million in its IRS filing covering the year ending just days before the 2012 election. Maguire said he expects the group to spend a similar amount this year.

Merkley and Wehby see the imminent arrival of the Freedom Partners advertising in starkly different terms. Merkley portrays the Kochs as powerful outside forces who don't have the interests of middle class Oregonians in mind. Wehby says she welcomes the help although she says she has had nothing to do with Freedom Partners.

"The beauty of our system of government is that it is based on 'We the People,' not 'We the Powerful,'" Merkley said. "The Koch brothers agenda is all about 'We the Powerful."

But Wehby said, "I'm happy that people see this as a seat that is in play...and people are investing in this race because they see it as an opportunity to get control of the Senate.

Merkley charged that Wehby has been a down-the-line supporter of the Kochs' agenda, at least in part because she's been angling for the Kochs to spend big in Oregon. He said the Koch group is providing "basically full-time television for a three-month period" and that they know Wehby "would be a good vote for them."

Merkley said that in a recent series in The Oregonian describing where the candidates stood on the issues came before the Senate, Wehby never differed from the positions advocated by another Koch-affiliated group, Americans for Prosperity.

"I'm not kowtowing to anybody to try to garner favor," Wehby countered. "That's not who I am."

Wehby does have at least one indirect connection to the Koch Brothers network: Andrew Miller, the CEO of Portland-based Stimson Lumber Co.

Miller, who had a much-chronicled romantic relationship with Wehby that had its rocky moments, said he has been to at least two of the semi-annual donor conferences hosted by the Kochs – who are also in the wood-products industry as owners of Atlanta-based Georgia-Pacific, which has operations in Oregon.

Miller said he's not donating to the Koch network's advertising and that Wehby didn't accompany him to any of the conferences (Wehby said she has never talked with either of the Koch brothers).

Miller said he last attended a Koch conference in January, at the Renaissance Esmeralda Indian Wells Resort near Palm Springs.

At the time, Miller said, the Kochs and their donors were focused on improving on their disappointing performance in 2012 – when President Obama was re-elected and Democrats kept the Senate – and were concerned about maintaining GOP control of the House.

"They thought it was going to be a long, uphill grind" in 2014, said Miller. Since then, he added, the political atmosphere for the Republicans has improved and the Koch network is clearly expanding its playing field.

Freedom Partners Chamber of Commerce, Inc. – the full name of the group's main entity -- has now bought advertising time in nine states and Miller said the group must see a clear opportunity here.

"They won't spend that kind of money on a lark," said Miller, adding that the Koch network has become increasingly sophisticated about analyzing races.

Freedom Partners itself is a good example of that. The group was once a clearing house that funneled money to a web of other organizations that ran advertising or engaged in other political activities. This year, the group – which did not return calls for comment – has built its own staff and is running its own ads, a move that appears to give the Kochs more control over the spending.

"Bit by bit, the Koch organization...is starting to pin people down and say, 'What are we getting for our money?'" said Miller.

Jeff Kropf, a former Oregon legislator who was state director of Americans for Prosperity from 2007 to 2011, said he wasn't surprised the group has entered Oregon.

"I think there are plenty of donors out there who think this is a competitive race," said Kropf, adding that he thinks it is closer than indicated by recent polls showing Merkley with a double-digit lead.

However, Kropf said that in one way, the Koch network now has less of a presence in Oregon. Americans for Prosperity recently closed its state chapter, taking away a grassroots operation focused on turnout.

"You need a ground game," said Kropf, "and I haven't heard of anything of that regard in Oregon."

At this point, it's not certain just how much Freedom Partners will spend in Oregon. The Merkley campaign, using data gathered by its media buyers, estimates that the group has bought $3.6 million in television time in Oregon through the election. About $1.5 million of that comes from cable.

Some television stations have posted information about the ad buys in publicly accessible files, and they seem to indicate a buy of about that size.

For example, KATU and KOIN, two of the four commercial stations in Portland that carry sizable amounts of political advertising, reported that Freedom Partners has reserved $857,000 in ads through the Nov. 4 election. Add in cable buys, the other two major commercial Portland stations and the rest of the state, and it could easily reach that amount.

In comparison, Merkley has reserved about $2 million in TV time through the election. The amount is not directly comparable, however, because federal candidates can often obtain time at lower costs than other advertisers.

What's also unclear is the content of the advertising, which several media reports have said will be focused on the Senate race. So far, Freedom Partners has leaned heavily on ads criticizing Democratic senators for such things as their support of the Affordable Care Act.

Maguire, the Center for Responsive Politics researcher, said Freedom Partners can also run a large amount of advertising simply urging voters to vote for or against one of the candidates. While tax laws prohibit the non-profit – which is organized as a membership organization -- from making political advocacy its "primary purpose," it can spend plenty of money that way. And ads complaining about a senator's positions are billed as issue education, Maguire said.

"The long and short of it," he added, "is there's almost no circumstance in which they will be required to disclose their donors."